PacNet subscribers who thought that they were in the clear from Odex’s means to get their names may have to think twice soon. Odex has filed an earlier appeal for the case to be reheard and both Odex and PacNet were called back to the chambers to discuss on some issues and to have their submissions made by the end of next week.

I am not sure how everything will turn out to be, but it still bothers me that Odex is asking the parents of children who downloaded anime to pay thousands of dollars in settlement. While I agree that downloading illegal stuffs (and not all anime are illegal to download, from what I understand) is not right, the extent to which Odex is asking for money is a little scary. Of course it also troubles me that Singnet delivers the name list to their door step (and I heard that the latter allegation may be wrong).

Odex and Pacific Internet’s (PacNet) lawyers were called back to the High Court on Thursday morning for a brief in-chambers discussion with Justice Woo Bih Li.

The Straits Times understands that Justice Woo raised a number of additional points of law, and asked both parties to give written submissions on their positions on these issues, by the end of next week.

There is no date set for any further hearings, or when a verdict can be expected in the appeal.

Odex, which distributes Japanese animated cartoons or anime here, is appealing a lower court decision denying it access to the names of PacNet subscribers it alleged were downloading pirated anime.

Odex had sent letters demanding thousands of dollars in settlement from SingNet broadband users it alleged were downloading pirated anime.

It sought a court order to get these names, and subsequently managed to obtain a court order to have access to the identities of alleged downloaders from StarHub.

But it failed to obtain a court order to get the names of PacNet downloaders, and it is appealing this now.